Caring
by RobertDowneyJrLove
Summary: For the first time in a long time, Steve Rogers felt like someone cared for him; not like he was being gushed over or worshipped but genuinely cared for him. And it was the best damn thing he had felt in a long time.


"You look like hell."

The infirmary - a floor of mostly static white hospital beds, hospital green clad nurses and horrid fluorescent lighting - is mostly empty except for the few night-shift nurses and for that Steve Rogers is grateful. Not that he doesn't enjoy her company but the S.H.I.E.L.D infirmary nurses had a notorious repuation for being gossips and he really doesn't want rumors about him and Natasha spread around the building. Her presence, in her catsuit no less, while he's sitting on a hospital bed in khaki trousers and no shirt with what's left of his suit laying next to him, would only feed the rumor mill. While he's content to let the ladies do their own thing, gossip though it may be, he would much prefer not to be the subject of the horrendously false rumors that spread through S.H.I.E.L.D like wildfire.

"Thanks," Steve responds dryly, the sharp blue of his eyes meeting her own crisp green orbs. "I think."

She offers him a dry laugh, loping into the exam room with a swing of her luscious hips. He feels embarrassed and awkward under her intense stare as she scans his body with her eyes. There's a rough abrasion on his forehead, dried blood around his nostrils and bruises on his torso. All in all, it looked like someone had used him for a punching bag but with his body's ability to rapidly regenerate cells and speed up the healing process, he tends to ignore it. He only really comes to the infirmary to ensure the wounds are clean and healing properly.

"Assessment?" She raises a slender auburn eyebrow at him.

"My nose is already healed. There was no break, just some blood." Steve rubs his nose lightly and his hand instinctively moves up to the abrasion on his forehead - had someone tried to grate his forehead with a cheese grater? He flinches when he feels the dry, caked blood and broken skin. "This could take longer but as long as I keep it clean, it'll heal pretty quick."

"And the artwork on your stomach?" Natasha's green eyes flit over the artwork of bruises that paint his torso sickening shades of navy blue an d midnight purple.

"This?" His palm grazes the bruises lightly, "A couple of days."

"How'd you acquire such lovely artwork anyway?" She gathers the suit up, bunching it against her ribs and turns to jump up on the bed beside him. Being the gentleman that he is, Steve reaches down for her hips and easily lifts her onto the bed. "Thanks."

"Ex-prize fighter." Steve drags a hand through his hair, absently tugging on the blond strands. "He didn't lose fights and I know why."

"You don't lose fights, either, Steve." Natasha nudges him with her shoulder, jade eyes looking down at the suit bunched in her hands.

Steve just drops his head and laughs slightly, intense blue gaze tracing the curve of her calf and up to the delicate bend of her knee. Her hips and all of her delicious, tender curves are a wonderful contrast to the muscle-bound ex-prize fighter he had stared at for the last few days. She's softer, easier to trace and far easier on the eyes. When he meets her eyes, he's surprised at the tenderness he finds in them. He's so used to sharpness and the hot blaze that always burned bright in her eyes, it takes him a second to adjust to the tenderness.

"Natasha." He's no longer Captain America, super-soldier extraordinaire, the hero whose feet Phil Coulson worshipped at. There was none of that. Right now, in this moment, he is quite simply Steve Rogers - or Steven Rogers as it were.

"Steve."

"Tasha, you should know that I wasn't always like this." Steve's voice is soft, openly vulnerable because with Natasha, there's no need to hide anything.

"Steve," Natasha's hand is warm and gentle against his shoulder. "I know."

"No, I mean, yes, you know what Fury has in my file but you don't know everything." Steve closes his eyes and exhales deeply, obviously uncomfortable with the situation and the memories of his child-hood being drudged up. "You know about Erskine and the science experiment, you know what it did to me. What it made me, not who I was before. I wasn't the guy who won every fight, Natasha. I lost quite a few."

"Steve, you don't have too." Natasha shakes her head, his discomfort with the situation clear on his face. "You really don't..."

"You deserve to know, Tasha." His hands clench into his fists, the skin pulling taut and white across his knuckles. "I was a small kid. Abnormally small. I was always sick, with this or that. We didn't have much and my Mom couldn't work because she was taking care of me all the time. My Dad died before I was born and when I was eighteen, my Mom died of tuberculosis. I only really had one friend. His name was James Buchanan, Bucky, really. At least, that's what he was too me."

"What happened?" Natasha isn't sure she really wants to know but since he seems willing to tell her, she might as well help him along.

"When I was kid, I was too small to defend myself and you know how bullies are. When you're the smallest kid in the entire school, you're basically their main target." Steve sounds as if he's living through his own personal hell all over again. "Bucky, he was stronger than me. He could deal with the bullies that wanted to snap me in half. We enlisted together because I knew I'd be killed without him there. Either way, I was signing my own death warrant."

"But you're still here, you made it." Natasha wants him to see the bright side, even if she doesn't think like that. She doesn't want him to ever think that he had signed his life away. She wants him to see that what he endured; the hell he went through as a child made him the man he is. "You're stronger now, you can fight the bullies, you don't have to sign your death warrant to ensure the bullies don't kill you first. You can kill them first."

"I don't want to kill them. That's not me." Steve's nobility is pronounced. He's far too good to ever want to kill somebody for personal revenge. He doesn't work like that. That goes against his morals; against everything he believes in. "That's not me."

"I know." Natasha nods, looking down at the suit; the singed, blood spattered colors of the flag stare up at her.

Red. White. Blue.

It's strength and purity and honesty.

It's everything he represents. It's everything he is; everything he has ever been. It's his nobility, his morality, his strength and it's his bravery when in the face of danger. It's his leadership and his sharp mind. It's the physicality of what he is, of what he does and it's his mentality to be able to do it. It's everything that has shaped him and everything that will shape him. He doesn't have red on his ledger, like she does. He doesn't have the assassin experience that she does. His fight is a noble one and he fights it with everything he has, with everything he is. He refuses to let the bullies win.

"Need a ride home?" She needs out of this infirmary; away from the memories, away from everything.

She needs familiar. She needs to take him home and clean him up. She needs the familiarity of taking care of him, instead of reliving memories with him. Instead of realizing that he would always be too good for her. His ledger would always be white. He would never be able to do anything that would taint it. He's not perfect, by any means, but she does know that his moral compass is true north and she can't compete with that.

"Yeah." Steve turns to retrieve the white t-shirt on the pillow beside him and pull it over his head. He hops off of the bed and reaches for the suit in her hand. "You can leave that here. I called Fury, he said he'd have the infirmary send it to him and there'd be a new one waiting for me before the next mission comes in."

The suit is left hanging over the rail as she slips off of the bed to stand beside him. His arm slips around her and he presses a tender kiss into her temple before releasing her and starting toward the door. She follows wordlessly and in a few moments, she's matching him stride for stride despite the size difference. The nurses stare and gawk in wide-eyed wonder. He's Captain America. He might as well be a god around S.H.I.E.L.D, what with Fury and Coulson practically kissing the ground he walks on. To see him walk out with the Black Widow by his side is a sight to behold. Her reputation as a spy is well known and nobody questions her.

She'd probably kill them first.

xxx

His apartment is cool relief from the New York heat.

They barely make it through the door before his wrist is firmly clasped in her hand and she's practically dragging him to the bathroom. He follows her without a word; they don't need pointless chatter, just to fill the silence. They had both become accustomed to silence, learning to take comfort in a noiseless environment. He sits down on the toilet and waits patiently for her to do whatever she intends to do. A first aid kit is pulled out from under the sink - placed there more for her than for him - and she wrings out a soft muslin cloth underneath running water.

"The infirmary nurses do a crap job at first aid." She mumbles, gently wiping away the dried blood from his forehead. "They're required to undergo re-licensing each year, they should pay more attention."

"I think they're sweet." His lips twist into a wry grin, eyes dancing with mirth.

She says nothing, choosing instead to scowl silently and continue with her first aid. The abrasion on his forehead is healing nicely but she wants to make sure it heals without risk of infection. She cleans it up and smears some sort of antibiotic cream on it. There isn't much she can do about the bruises but she can clean up the blood around his nose. A cotton swab soaked in cool water easily swipes the blood from around his nostrils and on his upper-lip.

"Tasha," Steve sighs in exhaustion, his hands finding her hips.

"You need rest, Steve." Natasha rests her hands on his shoulders, looking down into his eyes. "You've been fighting for three days, you need rest."

He drops his forehead against her abdomen, inhaling the scent of leather and metal. It's strangely soothing to him, mostly because of the soft, warm body it's emanating from. She squeezes his shoulders and slides her hands to his biceps, giving them a gentle tug. He reluctantly stands up, shoulders slouching forward and his body lagging with weariness. He follows her into his bedroom and without a word makes his way to his closet to change. He slips into a pair of dark blue basketball shorts and forgoes the t-shirt.

The dark bruises that color his abs blue and purple disappear into the waistband of his shorts and it honestly makes her sick to see him so injured. She's dealt with far worse abuse to her own body but to see the horrid results of one hell of a beating on someone she's attracted to; on someone she cares about, it hurts.

"Get in bed, I'm going to see if I can find something for those bruises." She nods toward the bed as she darts off toward the bathroom.

He drags his hand through his hair and looks down to assess the damage. Oh. Well, that wasn't good. He knew he was bruised but he hadn't been paying all that much attention earlier. To be perfectly honest, he didn't notice injuries anymore. He was so used to his body healing quickly, it was easier just to ignore injuries and let his body work itself out. These bruises, however, even with the super-soldier serum allowing his body to regenerate cells, it would take some time.

He's just crawling into bed when she emerges from the bathroom, holding a tube of some sort of cream. She's stoic and seemingly emotionless as she takes a seat beside him and opens the tube. The cream is white and odorless when she squeezes it onto her fingertips and gingerly reaches out to rub it on his bruises. Her touch is light and he can barely feel it. Whatever she's putting on his bruises isn't going to do any good if she doesn't rub it in more, despite her obvious discomfort.

"Tasha, if you want that to do any good, you're going to have to rub it in a bit more." Steve suppresses his laughter. "Or, let me do it."

"I don't want to hurt you." Natasha looks genuinely concerned.

"It's fine, Tasha. You aren't going to hurt me." Steve shakes his head, reaching up to rub her arm comfortingly. "It's just a few bruises. Nothing I haven't felt before."

She tries not to think of how much experience he really has with bruises. The idea of him being so frail and vulnerable, living in a time when discrimination was common-place, sickens her more than the bruises had. Bullies, truly evil human beings exploiting the pain of another. Fighting wars in the name of his country. It all seems like emotional torture for someone like him; it seems so much worse than what they had gone through a year ago.

"There, all done." She screws the cap back on the tube of cream and disappears into the bathroom to put it away and wash her hands. "Happy Birthday, by the way."

"What?" His blonde eyebrows furrow in confusion. Natasha just laughs and pulls her phone from somewhere on her cat-suit - for the sake of his dignity, he does not want to think about where she had room to hide a cell phone in that suit - and shows him the calender. Sure enough, there on the screen, a blue box marked the current date. It was his birthday and the birthday of the country he represented. "Oh, it's July 4th, already?"

"Yes." Natasha nods, leaning closer to him. To his surprise, instead of kissing him like he expected, she just presses a tender kiss to his jaw and whispers in his ear. "Happy Birthday, Steven Rogers."

She leaves him to rest without another word, slipping out of his apartment into the dusky summer evening. Exhaustion tugs at him heavily, eyes growing heavy and threatening to close any minute. It's only early evening, not even sunset but he's been fighting for three days and his body is begging him for rest, for time to heal. He relaxes on his bed and falls asleep, Natasha's words locked tightly in his memory. It had been over sixty-six years since someone had wished him a happy birthday, the sentiment getting lost in the shuffle of bullies and illnesses, even with his mother. Yet a beautiful Russian spy, the last person he ever expected to acknowledge his birthday, had not only offered the sincere sentiment he hadn't heard in a long while, but she had taken care of him.

For the first time in a long time, Steve Rogers felt like someone truly cared for him. Not like somebody was just gushing over him or worshipping him, but truly caring about his well-being, emotionally and physically.

And it was the best damn thing he had felt in a long time.

* * *

**This went...not in the direction I thought it would. It kind of spiralled. I've been functioning for nineteen hours on four hours of sleep and more caffeine and sugar than should be allowed. So if you want the truth, I'm not sure what in the hell this is so if you could fill me in, that'd me great! Lol! Keep in mind that I was exhausted when I wrote this and in all likelihood, I will decide that something needs to be changed when I have had the proper amount of sleep and can function like a normal human being again, instead of a zombie. Leave me some love, Dolls! **

**Love ya, **

**RobertDowneyJrLove **

**P.S. Happy 4th of July, everyone! **


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